Courtney
Falls
25’ high Courtney Falls
is up Flag Creek.
This inspiring, beautiful
place is hard to find in the Columbine Hondo Wilderness Study Area.
beta facts:
name- Courtney Falls
height- 25’
elevation- 9170’
GPS coordinates- ± 36°39.085’N 105°31.748’W
flow- perennial
season- summer… earlier is better
accommodations- nearby Columbine Campground
ownership- Carson National Forest
access- 2½ mile hike with the last ¾ mile
being bushwhack
nearest town- Questa is 7½ miles northwest
and Red River is 8½ miles to the northeast
fun fact- this is a sweet place
essay bro:
Columbine watershed is splendid… one of my
favorites… time will uncover more waterfalls here. Courtney Falls is a ¾-mile mild bushwhack west up Flag Creek
from where trail 71 crosses it, just below Placer Fork. Flag Creek is sometimes dry here but
always flows at the falls.
Courtney found this waterfall for me. It’s sculpted in clean smooth granitic
bedrock, which leads me to believe that more falls are upstream from here… and
likely higher. Get up there
soon. Shoot a buncha photos and
share ‘em with me… ‘cause that Canyon is really steep… and I’m tired.
Feel free to print your own copy of my map
below.
See also: Columbine Lake Photos Below this map and Columbine Falls
Enhanced National Geographic 7.5’ topo map
however some of the unlabeled falls shown below have not been field verified
_______________one
mile______________
note- the small round, blue dot on the creeks above shows
whitewater-cascades that are not falls
Columbine Lake See
the map above
Columbine Lake is an old lake that has filled in considerably. However it is in a beautiful setting a thousand feet below Columbine Mountain. I am not a Wildlife Biologist… but could beavers be planted here? It is fed with a strong flowing perennial spring and a few of their favorite trees (aspens) are around… could beavers resurrect Columbine Lake’s original beauty? …or is 10,900’ elevation too high for them...???
Beavers live at 10,500’ in Lagunitas Lakes… farther north than here…
Also… Look at the extreme right-hand edge of my map up above… those abandon beaver dams are amazingly huge… the biggest I have ever seen. Beavers could again thrive where they once thrived. The old dams are up to eight feet high.
Columbine
Lake is at the headwaters of the Lake Fork of Columbine Creek. It is within the Columbine-Hondo
Wilderness Study Area.
Send questions and comments to doug.vivian@yahoo.com